


If I Didn't Ask

by SpyderScully



Category: The X-Files, The X-Files: I Want To Believe (2008)
Genre: MSR, Sculder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-29
Updated: 2014-11-29
Packaged: 2018-02-27 10:00:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2688638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpyderScully/pseuds/SpyderScully
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I Want to Believe" hurt me—a lot. So I might have taken matters into my own hands a little bit.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If I Didn't Ask

"You’re coming with me, right?"

He is standing in front of her, a folder in his hand, a hopeful and expectant expression on his handsome and bespectacled face. She swallows.

"Mulder." Her voice is patient but her chest is pained, and the sigh that follows his name is expelled deeper than she intended. She realizes its meaning is still felt. She bites her lip, steeling herself for the heartbroken and disappointed look she knows he will display when she finally gives him her answer. Her dry tongue moves hesitantly around her equally dry mouth.

"We’ve talked about this," she says mournfully, "You know I can’t."

They have talked about it, extensively so; after the Father Fitzgerald Crissman investigation, during their time away together, and on the plane ride back. She had expressed then what she hadn’t been able to before when the FBI had approached them about the strange case. She had confessed her guilt in projecting her own needs and fears onto him and how she mourned not standing by him as she had for so many years. She had expressed regret and grief over walking away from him - from them. She had confessed that although it was over, their time as partners had not been without its joys and exhilaration.

For six years she had told herself those days were past and she had believed it then, as she believes it now. For Mulder, she has her doubts. She had known then it would only be a matter of time before he would come to her, revealing that the FBI had approached him again and that the X-Files had a chance once more, asking her to come with him just as he had during the clairvoyance case. A part of her had admitted she would be disappointed if he did not ask her to come along, but she also realized then that her only choice, her only desire, was to allow him to feel fulfilled and happy and to let him go.

This is what she is remembering when his response surprises her.

"I know you can’t, Scully." He says calmly, "But you’d never forgive me if I didn’t ask you. I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t ask you.”

Startled, she meets his gaze. She realizes he has changed so much since the Father Fitzgerald Crissman case and since their vacation. He has allowed his beard to grow back again slightly, but it’s trimmed now. His hair is short once more, cropped and spiky as it was before his abduction. He’s lost weight due to the steady increase of mornings he’s spent running endlessly through the trails surrounding their property. He’s lost some of the tired hardness that had been creeping into his eyes. He’s younger; he no longer looks like a recluse, driven cynical with his inability to fulfill his desire to work for the truth. He looks like Mulder again.

She pushes back the sense of foreboding that prickles through her nerves, the one that she spent years avoiding alongside the several years spent in its absence. It’s suddenly back now, a companion to the desire to reach out and be with him in the way they had once been before. Partners. Companions. Avengers of untruth.

"I meant what I said several months back," he continues honestly in her silence. "I can’t do this without you." She is suddenly painfully aware of the warmth of his body across from hers - another reminder of the life that is coming back to him. Seeing him in this light reminds her of how old she suddenly feels.

"Can’t you at least think about it?"

His question is phrased so gently, as if he knows very well that of course she will think about it - she’ll spend sleepless nights thinking about it - yet he wants her to feel as if she has a choice.

As if.

A part is her is tempted in ways that she ignored, denied, and did not feel several months back. The romance of returning to their less stagnant ways is attractive to her, but there are negatives. She remembers the sweaty, cramped hours in the car. She remembers the last minute flights, the smeared blood, the calls at three in the morning. She recalls the sense of fear she always felt when he was torn from her, when she couldn’t reach him - when he couldn’t reach her. Musty hotel rooms and seedy bars. Cigarettes and crumpled bodies. Monsters - both human and not of this world.

There are so many reasons for her not to do this.

But something else slips into her memory: images and feelings she has kept locked away for so long. She now recalls the feeling of satisfaction that sparked through her whenever she discovered a missing piece of truth on an autopsy table. The fluttering of excitement in her belly whenever he introduced her as “my partner”. Coming home late at night to her spacious and welcoming apartment after closing a case. Seeing the eagerness and excitement on Mulder’s face when he clambered into their office clutching a hefty folder containing an unsolved mystery. The thrill of flirtatious banter as she tried to pick apart his impossible theories bit by bizarre bit.

She realizes that’s what she misses most - watching Mulder delirious and intent with purpose.

For six years she has had what she wanted, what she dreamed she wanted. A home. Regular hours. A steady career where she knows where she stands when she walks in every morning. Consistency.

Mulder gave that to her. The thought slips into her brain before she manages to shy away from it.

Now she has a chance to return the favor to him. And he’s asking if she wants to be a part of it. She shivers as this thought dawns on her.

Very slowly she reaches out, sliding her index finger along the edge of the folder he still grips in his hand. Her voice is soft but clear.

"Is it too late to get another plane ticket?"

The smile on his face is almost enough to bring tears to her eyes.


End file.
